One of the most appreciated features of the E384 is its extremely long endurance without requiring special launch or recovery equipment. Using an E384 with a Sony WX500, users can fly nearly 100 minutes and collect up to 1,000 acres of imagery at 5cm/pixel in a single flight. Some have used this ability to map up to 4500 acres in a single work day.

Now we’re ready to push those limits further, a lot further. Two simple improvements will drastically increase the area you can map: the QX1 Integrated Camera, and the E384-LR Long Range Battery Pack. These features do not require a new or different drone and will be available as simple upgrades for all current E384 users. Here’s what makes them different.

QX1 Integrated Camera:

The QX1’s unique form factor allows it to fit into the E384 fuselage in the landscape orientation. This increases the effective width of each pass, so more area can be covered with the same flight distance.

For very long flights, the built in camera battery doesn’t have enough power. So we added a dedicated power supply that runs off the flight battery, ensuring the camera remains active for the entire flight.

With these two improvements, a full duration test was flown with a QX1 mapping payload. We chose a day with lighter winds, averaging just 2.75m/s. Although it is less efficient, a continuous turn loiter was used for convenience.

Battery: 13.2 Ah Li-Ion, 814 g

Payload: QX1, 252 g

GSD: 5cm/pix

Overlap/Sidelap: 60% / 60%

Average Groundspeed: 12.48 m/s

Average Windspeed: 2.75 m/s

Average Current Draw: 7.11 A

Average Bank: 11.6 degrees

Results:

Estimated Mapping Coverage: 2,100 Acres (850Ha)

That’s 3.3 square miles, enough to cover most of lower Manhattan in a single flight.

We flew until the motor lost power and cut off, but we recommend considering 110 minutes or sub-11V battery readings to be the end of normal flight. Being able to fly 82km means the E384-LR can map up to 2,100 acres in a single flight. It is by a large margin the most effective mapping platform available today. Projects on the order of tens of thousands of acres are now feasible with a single drone, within a modest budget. The E384-LR Long Range Battery Pack is available for pre-order now and will be available soon at Event38.com. For more information, please contact us.

Jeff Taylor, CEO & founder, has a technical as well as management background. Jeff has been fascinated by Flight and Space ever since he was a little kid. Right after graduating college, Jeff joined SpaceX as an electrical engineer where he helped launch and recover the first commercial space capsule to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere. He was also previously the Director of Research and Develoment at 3D Robotics.